


We Can Live On Misbehaviour

by GloriaMundi



Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: Community: inception_kink, M/M, Multi, Projections, Threesome - M/M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-02-23
Updated: 2011-02-23
Packaged: 2017-10-15 21:31:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 15,715
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/165135
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GloriaMundi/pseuds/GloriaMundi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>From this prompt:<br/><i>Projection!Arthur represents Arthur's romantic and sexual intentions towards Eames. He's pretty much like Arthur in every way, except for the condescension is replaced with lust and lewdness. Arthur hates talking to this Projection!Arthur. One day Arthur and Eames are running a practice run and Projection!Arthur makes his presence with Eames and begins to successfully seduce him. This makes Arthur more jealous than he realizes.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on the kink_meme, [here](http://community.livejournal.com/inception_kink/15916.html?thread=32333612#t32333612): tidied up, and beta'd by **anatsuno**.
> 
> Title from The Arcade Fire 'Rebellion (Lies)'  
>  _people say that your dreams  
>  are the only things that save you  
> come on baby in our dreams  
> we can live on misbehaviour_  
> come to think of it, the lyrics of that one song have spawned several of my Inception fics.

When Arthur was a kid, before he knew any better, he used to tell people his secrets. It seldom ended well. There was the time in grade school he had a crush on Ellie from the next street over and he’d sworn Josh to secrecy about it, but then he’d been too ashamed not to lie when Josh dashed up to Ellie and told her "Arthur loves you!".

Or high school, when (under the influence of Hawaiian Blue 20/20 and Melissa Barnett's clove cigarettes) he'd 'fessed up to liking the way Leo diCaprio looked in _Gilbert Grape_ , and spent the rest of the semester learning how to spot a gang of queerbashers before they spotted him.

Or ...

So most of Arthur's heavy conversations these days are in his head, where nobody else can twist his secrets into weapons. He'll lie awake at night thinking through the pros and cons of a situation, examining the intimate anatomy of his desires and fears. He puts it all into words, though he'd never write those words: mostly he doesn't even whisper them to his dark and empty room. But words give feelings more structure. Like he's capturing and taming his emotions. Like he's wrestling his own heart, and winning.

One of the things he didn't expect, when he was seconded to Project Morpheus, was that dreamspace would give him the opportunity to sit down and have a one-to-one with his subconscious. It's kind of cool. (It's kind of freaky, too).

Not that his subconscious is necessarily the sort of guy he'd choose to hang out with.

"C'mon, Arthur," says the man sitting across from him in this distinctly Impressionist French cafe. "You know you wanna hit that. You know he wants it too."

The projection (Arthur won't dignify him -- it -- with a name) is wearing a suit that Arthur's been eyeing in this season's Zegna collection. His smile has an almost feline inscrutability as he raises his glass to his lips. Arthur has given up wondering whether he actually looks like that when he's awake. He thinks he does: or a part of him thinks he does, which should be the same thing.

In dreamspace, no one can see you sneer.

"C'mon, man," says the projection. "I should know, right? I'm you: what I want is what you want."

"You're a tiny fragment of my subconscious mind," says Arthur coolly. "A subconscious that's come up with scenarios where I walk down Fifth Avenue in my briefs. A subconscious that thinks it'd be cool to hang out with Adam Lambert getting high and -- yeah, okay, bad example. A subconscious that makes me grateful every day that I don't have more imagination."

"Oh, we've got imagination, all right," purrs his projection, with a pout that's frankly embarrassing. "We imagine him all the time, you know we do. We imagine that mouth, we imagine how that mouth'd look wrapped --"

Apparently some dreamworkers falter at the prospect of shooting aspects of themselves. Arthur has no such qualms.

He glances around the cafe. The other projections ... well, sure, they're his, they're him, they're playing it cool; but none of them seem perturbed by the gunshot, nor by the sudden disappearance of a man from their midst. A couple of them cast questioning glances at Arthur, but whatever they see in his expression is enough to make them turn away again.

Arthur's not stupid. He's not stupid, he's not mad, and he knows how much damage a rogue projection can do. So far, his projections have behaved themselves (more or less) whenever anyone else is in Arthur's dreams. Nobody's been ambushed or murdered. There haven't been stray freight trains ploughing through downtown intersections. Arthur's projections have behaved just as Arthur would behave: generally oblivious, occasionally homicidal if someone starts to nudge the boundaries of his dream.

But there's that streak of ... Arthur's not mad. It's just that his subconscious has gotten hold of a stray thought and magnified it -- as the human mind, trained or untrained, is wont to do -- out of all proportion. Arthur does not harbour any untoward desires towards Mr Eames. He may, on occasion, have allowed himself to notice that Mr Eames is an attractive, if brutish, specimen of masculine good looks. That's all it is. It's nothing to worry about, nothing that needs to be examined. He's dealing with it.

* * *

When Eames designs a dream -- not something he does often these days, since his dream-architecture's only competent at best -- he pulls in colour, texture, ambience from everywhere. His skylines flow from Baroque to Palladian and on into the impossibly fluid lines of that Roger Dean poster he had on his wall as a teenager. His projections, on the whole, are a cheerful and eclectic mob. In any given dream he might recognise a B-list celebrity, a profile from Bruegel, or the boy in the Istanbul corner-shop where he used to buy his cigarettes.

Arthur's dreams, whether he's recreating a memory or building from scratch, are different. They're more mathematical than organic: they cohere. And Arthur's projections -- well, projections reflect the mind of the dreamer, one way or another, and Arthur's projections are neat, collected, cool.

Eames likes to rile Arthur's projections as subtly and deniably as possible. It's become something of a game between him and Arthur. Lately, though, he's begun to attract their attention rather more than he's comfortable with. He doesn't even have to change anything -- he doesn't even have to change _himself_ \-- before he gets jostled. Arthur's projections tend to stare at him more than they stare at anyone else. Arthur's projections, given the opportunity, close in on Eames like iron filings flocking to a magnet.

"Have I done something to upset you?" enquires Eames, with pardonable heat, once he's recovered from the suffocating attentions of a particularly enthusiastic crowd.

Arthur's a step behind him, but only a step. Eames watches him wake, quickly and cleanly as ever, and lets him take that one affirming breath before he repeats his question.

"No," says Arthur, eyebrows raised. "Why?"

"Your subconscious is getting awfully handsy," says Eames. "I'd barely got my bearings before your projections were all over me. If there's a problem --"

"There isn't," says Arthur. If he's lying, he's doing it more smoothly than usual. "You must have changed something."

"I didn't have _time_ to change anything!"

"Maybe my subconscious doesn't like your cologne," Arthur says. His smile doesn't quite reach his eyes. "It's my subconscious, Eames: I have no idea what motivates it."

The Oakwood job is straightforward, or should be: a single level, which Arthur's already designed and built, and which Eames -- in the persona of the mark's recently-deceased former boss -- needs to be able to navigate without worrying about overzealous projections. He says as much.

"If your subconscious jumps on me before I've even put on the forge, how's it going to react when I change?"

"One way to find out," says Arthur, busy with the PASIV. "Up for another round?"

"Absolutely," says Eames brightly. "I can hardly wait to get up close and personal with your subconscious again, darling."

The look that Arthur shoots him does not bode well.

This time round, Eames finds himself in a small, windowless room with a fancy dressing-room mirror. "Thanks, Arthur," he says to the mirror, and wastes no time in assuming the appearance of Mr Martin Oakes, a lantern-jawed gentleman with a permanent five o'clock shadow, clear hazel eyes and an unsightly smattering of acne scars across his left cheek. Oakes died last month in a hit-and-run: he seems to have been the only person Eileen Scott actually trusted at Oakwood Estates, and now that he's gone her refusal to discuss her caseload with her new superior has become mission-critical.

Christ. This is the sort of thing Eames thought he'd left behind when he opted for a career on the wrong side of the law.

Oakes firmly in place, Eames opens the door and steps out into the main office area. It's distressingly corporate: grey carpet, white walls, partitions upholstered in steel-blue hessian. The office hums with that indeterminate white noise that means 'business as usual' in any dream. There are people -- projections -- everywhere, smartly-dressed (of course), coming and going with stacks of files, cups of coffee, mobile phones. Eames can smell the coffee, because Arthur's a perfectionist like that.

Nobody pays him any attention at all.

* * *

Arthur's sitting in the reception area of Oakwood Estates' offices, sipping coffee and waiting for Eames to come and find him. He can't feel the vague itch of angry projections anywhere: maybe Eames isn't in the dream yet. Or maybe Arthur's subconscious was paying attention, earlier, when Eames was complaining about the projections' hostility.

He doesn't like his emotions to get in the way. Sometimes they do: he never liked being the dreamer when Nash was around, because it was all too common for his irritation at Nash to manifest in a variety of unpleasant ways. This ... this thing with Eames is worse. If Arthur didn't know better he'd swear that his projections have taken on lives of their own. (In which case they might be spawning their own projections, from their own subconscious minds: and so ad infinitum. Ad infernum. A neat paradox, except that it's his dream that's going to hell.)

"Hey!"

The voice is horribly familiar. Arthur already knows, before he looks up, who he'll see: his confidant, his alter ego, the one person (not a person) he can trust with his secrets. He hasn't come up with a theory as to why this projection usually looks exactly like Arthur himself, nor why this projection is so very persistent. Projections are supposed to be ephemeral: it's their nature.

"He's here, you know," confides his projection, taking the seat across from Arthur, mirroring his posture effortlessly. "Eames is here. He looks like somebody else right now, but that won't matter, will it? It's him we want, never mind the forge -- though of course we do mind what he looks like, we bring it to mind every night. His shoulders. His neck." The projection licks its lips. "That _mouth_ , Arthur. We can't --"

"Why don't you just fuck off?" says Arthur coolly. This is his own goddamned mind, for fuck's sake. He is not going to be goaded by his own mind.

"Any good psychologist would tell you that repression is bad for the psyche," purrs the projection. "Wouldn't it be better to give in -- here in your dream, if that makes you feel safer -- and stop fighting yourself?"

Arthur has never quite bought into the get-out-of-jail-free approach to his subconscious. Sure, it's easy enough to disclaim responsibility for what you don't control: but it's his subconscious, nobody else's.

"If I'm repressed, it's for a reason," he snaps. "And if you're the bit of me that I have to fight, that's fine by me."

Somewhere nearby, there's a ripple of laughter. A door beeps, and creaks open.

"Oh," says the projection gleefully, "here he is now!"

Arthur shoots himself -- the self sitting on the other couch -- just as Martin Oakes' nasal voice calls out his name.

"What was that all about?" says Eames-as-Oakes, staring at the empty space where Arthur's doppelganger was sitting. He's frowning. "Arthur?"

Arthur says, "It's okay. Just a projection."

"You shot a projection of yourself?" says Eames. "Though of course, you'd say exactly the same if _you_ were the projection."

"It's me, Eames," snaps Arthur. "Just now, awake, you were complaining about the projections getting nasty, so I said we'd go again. Hell, I even set up a private room for you to change in. It's my dream, and it's not falling apart. Okay?"

Eames looks mollified -- well, Oakes does, and frankly it's a lot more convincing an expression than it would've been on Eames' own face -- but he's still somewhat edgy. "Why'd you shoot him?" he says. "Are there some issues of self-worth that we should be discussing, Arthur?"

"He was being an asshole," says Arthur.

"Good to know," says Eames. "That you're capable of being an arsehole, I mean."

"At least it's only my subconscious," retorts Arthur. "So, no trouble now you're ... not yourself?" He gestures at Martin Oakes' shiny suit and cheap shoes.

"Your projections couldn't give a toss about Mr Oakes," says Eames. "But let's try an experiment, shall we?" And between 'experiment' and 'shall', he's suddenly Eames again, Martin Oakes banished to wherever worn-out forges go.

* * *

"Oh, _hello_ ," comes a very familiar voice from across the lobby, and when Eames turns to look, it's Arthur. Except that Arthur is right next to him, and Eames can feel sheer rage crackling off him like static.

Maybe this is the projection Arthur blew away earlier: maybe not. Projections are, on the whole, interchangeable. With certain exceptions (Cobb's nightmare perversion of Mal springs to mind) they don't hang around for long enough to become familiar. But this one, prowling towards Eames with clear and intriguing intent, looks as though he'd like to become very familiar indeed.

There are, thinks Eames, definite pros and cons to this situation. Pro: Arthur is looking at him with what can only be termed desire. Con: it's not the real Arthur. Pro: this is Arthur's subconscious, which means that deep down Arthur _does_ , probably, want Eames. Con: 'deep down' is a long way from 'right now'.

"Pleased to meet you," says Eames amiably to the projection, with the kind of smile that seems to rile the waking Arthur so much. "That is ... _have_ we met?"

"Eames," hisses Arthur from behind him. "Are you --"

"Think of me as your therapist, Arthur," murmurs Eames. "Perhaps the three of us can --"

In the way of dreams, several improbable things happen simultaneously:  
\- the projection blows him a kiss, a gesture so completely at odds with quotidian Arthur that Eames forgets what he was about to say.  
\- something cold and metallic nudges the soft place behind Eames' ear.  
\- he's abruptly and unpleasantly awake, and his ears are ringing.

Eames surges up from his seat: it's delayed and misplaced shock, but he needs to be moving. When Arthur's eyes open Eames makes sure he's looming over him, one hand on either arm of Arthur's chair.

"You shot me," he says, narrowing his eyes. "What the fuck?"

"We were done," says Arthur, cool as ever. "There wasn't any point in sticking around."

"As simple as that, eh?" says Eames. "If you say so, Arthur." He lets go of the chair, steps back, gives Arthur a couple of seconds to relax before he leans in again and says, "Though I'd've sworn there was more to it than that."

"More to what?" snaps Arthur, exasperated. "Everything was fine while you were forging Oakes: when you dropped the forge, the projections started in on you. Would you rather I'd left you to be torn apart?"

Eames stands back, shrugs. "Good point," he says. He doesn't stop watching Arthur. There's something else going on here, and he's damned if he'll just let it go. Arthur's good at maintaining that smooth calm demeanour that's become his trademark, but Eames -- whose business is people-watching -- has made a hobby of observing him over the last few years. He likes to think he knows more about Arthur's tells, Arthur's facade, Arthur's bloody-mindedness than Arthur would willingly let anyone see. Besides, Eames has just had an intriguing encounter with a hitherto-unsuspected element of Arthur's subconscious, and he's itching to find out if his instincts are ringing true.

Arthur's on his feet, rolling his shoulders, swigging water from a half-empty bottle. He looks -- he _gives the impression of being_ \-- as relaxed and easy as ever.

"Dinner?" says Eames casually, hooking his jacket off the back of his chair and turning towards the door. "I'm starving. Fancy that Thai place down the road?"

"I'll take a raincheck," says Arthur, exactly as Eames predicted. "I want to go over the layout again. Oakes' office isn't right yet."

Eames is pretty sure that Oakes' office is as perfect as the rest of the level. "Fine," he says easily. "Want me to grab you some takeout?"

"No, you head off: I'll get something on my way back," says Arthur. "See you in the morning, yeah?"

"Don't overdo it," says Eames with a wink, and lets himself out.

It's dark and rainy, and he isn't actually at all hungry. Not for food, anyway. He's _starving_ for information, for understanding. He wants to know what Arthur's going to do when he goes back under. He wants to see whether that same projection pops up when Arthur's alone. And if he gets to overhear what Arthur has to say to his subconscious, all the better.

He gives it ten minutes before he cracks the door open again and peers inside.

* * *

Arthur busies himself with paperwork for a few minutes -- long enough for Eames to pull the 'forgot my umbrella' trick, or just to sidle back -- but once he's satisfied that the coast is clear, he doesn't waste time hooking himself up and going under.

Bloody Eames and his percipience. Bloody Eames and the way he never stops _looking_. Arthur has learnt to feel Eames' presence, his attention, like a vanishingly gentle touch. Like an imminent storm. Arthur has become accustomed to Eames; too much so, if his projections are any barometer of the feelings he doesn't waste time examining.

Martin Oakes' office is dim and quiet. Arthur leaves the lights off and the blind open, preferring to let the soft winter twilight filter in. He sits down in Oakes' chair and waits for the door to open.

"How do I get rid of you?" he wonders aloud when his projection -- the one that's Arthur's sheer stubborn persistence, if nothing else -- lets himself in. "You're a liability."

"I'm your liability," says his projection, with that small secret smile that so infuriates Arthur.

"You're fucking things up."

"I'm simply showing you what it is you want," says his projection. He turns away from Arthur, examining his reflection in the window. "Showing you what you can have, if you just ask for it."

 _In your dreams_ , Arthur bites back. Because that's the problem, isn't it? These are nobody's dreams but his own. And right now he's dreaming: dreaming an argument with himself over what he wants or doesn't want, what he's hidden so deeply --

"Shame you decided you can't forge," says his projection. "We could keep it between ourselves, then."

"What the --"

But Arthur's train of thought is comprehensively derailed when, between one breath and the next, it's _Eames_ looking back at him. Eames solid and muscular beneath clothes that don't quite fit, as though his body's forever changing and his wardrobe's a lost cause. Eames with his head tilted just so, at that angle that makes Arthur want to bite --

"We can keep it between ourselves, darling," purrs Eames, "if you're too shy to say it out loud."

"You're not Eames," snaps Arthur, trying to see the, the folds, the edges, the ways in which this projection -- he's never been able to forge convincingly, for fuck's sake, he doesn't have the right kind of attention to detail -- is a lie.

"Come and find out," invites his projection: but he's not waiting for Arthur, he's coming towards him, three steps across the office and he's close enough for Arthur to feel the warmth radiating from him, to smell the cologne and that subtle unnameable smell beneath it that's just Eames, to see the way Eames' pupils are wide in the gloom, to --

Okay. It's possible that his subconscious, at least, has been paying a _lot_ of attention to Mr Eames.

"This is what you want," murmurs the projection.

"This is masturbation," Arthur bites out, and if his hand's on Eames' shoulder it's to hold him at bay. "This is just jerking off."

"You say that as though it's a bad thing," says the projection, in the exact tone of voice that Arthur's heard Eames say those words.

 _Way_ too much attention.

"I don't want Eames," he says.

"Is that so?"

Arthur shakes his head. "You're not real," he says. "You're --"

"I'm the best you'll get," says the projection. "Listen --"

Arthur shoots him. The body disappears before it can hit the floor.

"Fuck," says Arthur. Because that hasn't fixed anything: in fact, it's made the problem worse, because now he knows just how much time he's spent watching _Eames_ , and --

Out of the corner of his eye he catches movement outside his door, and frowns; steps back into the shadows, angling his gaze to see out.

He's there, and so's Eames.

Eames's arms are around Arthur, those big broad hands splayed over spine and hip. Arthur -- Arthur's goddamned _projection_ \-- is biting at Eames' throat, just where Arthur's been wanting to --

It's not real. The real Eames is down the road, eating Thai. The real Arthur's sweating, biting his lip, alone in this darkened office, _wanting_ , while his subconscious puts on a command performance just for him.

* * *

Arthur's out, calm as a sleeping cat, horribly vulnerable in the empty room -- did nobody ever tell him not to dream alone? Eames can't complain, though, because if Arthur were a man to play by the rules he wouldn't be Arthur. And Eames wouldn't be here, settling down in the chair next to Arthur's, pumping his fist to bring up a vein that isn't already sore, checking the somnacin levels and plugging himself into Arthur's dreamscape.

It's the Oakwood office again. Most of the lights are off, and Eames catches himself being surprised by the silence: there's a palpable after-hours feel to the place, and the sound of a distant vacuum, or a cleaner's tuneless whistling, would complete the ambience.

On the other hand this isn't a dream designed for an audience: it's a place for Arthur to confront his ... his fears? His hopes?

Himself.

Arthur's in Martin Oakes' office, backlit by the violet glow of winter dusk from the picture-window. Arthur's sitting back in Oakes' chair, perfectly at ease: Arthur's standing looking down at the man in the chair, and maybe he's speaking but the door's shut, and Eames can't hear his voice through the glass that divides Oakes' sanctum from the main office.

One of them -- at least one of them -- is a projection. Has to be. Perhaps _both_ of them are projections, and the real Arthur's prowling the open-plan office, on the lookout for intruders. Perhaps this is a trap for Eames. Perhaps Arthur knows him too well, knew that his curiosity would bring him back. Eames, moving as quietly and unobtrusively as he can, draws a chair into the shadow of a pillar, half-hidden by a glossy-leafed potted palm, and settles himself to watch.

When he looks back at the two figures, one of them isn't Arthur any more.

It's impossible to be sure in the dim light, but Eames would bet good money that the silhouetted figure confronting Arthur is his own self. Or, rather, Arthur's version of him. There's something in the stance, the breadth of the shoulders, the way the projection's muscling in on Arthur and the way Arthur's hand comes up instinctively to keep some space between them: in _Arthur_ 's body language, how it's at once aggressive and defensive ...

For a moment Eames thinks that Arthur and his projection are going to kiss. There's a weird tight feeling in his throat, because this isn't even his dream and he's still about to see something that can surely only happen in the privacy of his own mind. It's not that he can't imagine kissing Arthur, or even Arthur kissing back: it's that imagination is, realistically, all it'll ever be.

There's a sudden sharp sound: a shot. Arthur (or his projection) hasn't bothered with the suppressor this time.

Eames is caught between the desire to laugh (because that's so perfectly _Arthur_ , shoot first and talk later) and the urge to flee, to get himself out of this dream before Arthur finds him and shoots him as well. Maybe he can pretend to be a projection too, since Arthur's already allowed one version of Eames into his dreams. Maybe he --

"See something interesting, Mr Eames?"

 _Fuck_ , thinks Eames. He gets to his feet, amiable smile already in place, to find that Arthur's ghosted up beside him, close enough for Eames to hear the faint rustle of his clothing and the sough of his breath. There's just enough light for Eames to make out the bruise on Arthur's wrist where the IV dragged a little, earlier: for him to see the curl of Arthur's smile, the glint in his eye.

"Very interesting, thank you, Arthur," he says. "Though I must confess to being a little surprised."

"Surprised?" enquires Arthur, stepping closer.

"Mmm," says Eames. "That you'd let a projection of me take such liberties with you."

"Think of it as a practice run," says Arthur, and before Eames can produce a suitable retort Arthur's arms are wrapping around him, and it'd be rude not to reciprocate, not to put his own hands on Arthur's body, not to take the kiss that's being offered and return it with interest.

And Arthur is very definitely interested. His hands are pressing against the lines of Eames' body, his tongue's exploring the interior of Eames' mouth. He kisses with focus and intent, with complete attention. He is utterly convincing.

Eames lets himself be convinced.

* * *

Arthur's watching the two of them from the shadows of the office. They're perfectly illuminated by a single spotlight that's winked on above them: he can see everything, and it's ... it's quite a show. He'd thank his subconscious for the performance -- both participants are fully-clothed, not even really groping each other, but there's so much sheer _want_ in the way they're kissing, the shapes their bodies make as they curve towards and press against one another -- if he wasn't so fucking pissed with his own brain for this new, unwelcome discovery.

Not that it's exactly ... unreasonable. Arthur, who tries to be scrupulously honest with himself, readily acknowledges Eames' roguish good looks, muscular physique, excellent bone structure, et cetera. He's willing to admit that he likes the way the two of them spar and banter. He's immensely grateful for the fact that, in any professional setting, he can rely on Eames to keep a level head, get the job done, and achieve maximum impact with minimum effort.

So it's hardly surprising that his subconscious thinks he should make a move on Eames. Hardly a surprise, either, that Eames -- being just another facet of that same subconscious -- should respond with such enthusiasm. It _is_ , however, a surprise when this Eames puts his hands (fingers flexing, curling, spreading) on projected-Arthur's shoulders and steps back, putting space between them.

Arthur's fists clench. He wants to hit something, possibly himself. Only _he_ could get blown off by his own mind. Reaching back for the gun that wasn't in the waist of his pants a moment ago, he strides forward and shoulders the door open.

"-- very sudden, and to be honest --" Eames is saying, but he stops mid-sentence and stares as Arthur emerges from Oakes' office. Arthur scowls at him: scowls at the version of himself that's standing there up close and personal with Eames, smirking: Arthur's going to wipe that smirk off his (literally _his own_ ) face, he's going to --

"Don't you think you've carried out enough dream-executions for one day, Arthur?" says Eames, gently reproving.

"Define 'enough'," snaps Arthur.

Eames' head is cocked, and he's glancing between Arthur and Arthur's doppelgänger as though they're an optical illusion he can't quite process. "So," he says insouciantly, "which one of you is the real Arthur?"

"Me, Eames," says the projection, dipping its chin so that it can look up through its eyelashes. "It's me."

Arthur swallows a sigh and keeps quiet; folds his arms and glares at them both. He's increasingly sure that Eames is, somehow, actually _here_ : that he's not a projection at all. Maybe it's the way he's holding back from ravishing the ... the Arthur in his arms. Maybe it's his evident bemusement at being confronted with two versions of the same man.

Maybe it's the way he looks Arthur in the eye and says, "I confess to feeling slightly cheated. I'd rather hoped I was getting the real thing."

Something treacherously warm leaps in Arthur's chest. He quashes it.

"Hey!" says the projection, scowling at Eames. "Given our line of work, isn't it kind of elitist to privilege reality over dreams? After all," and it shoots a sly sidelong glance at Arthur, "reality can be so very ... deceptive."

Eames huffs a laugh at that. His hands are still on the projection, but his attention's all on Arthur.

"My imagination can't be all bad," says Arthur "if it's come up with the two of you. The alternative being, Mr Eames, that you've invited yourself into my dream."

"I'd hoped I'd already be here," says Eames, with a leer which is infuriating enough to make Arthur even more certain of Eames' authenticity.

"Of _course_ you're already here," murmurs the projection, leaning into Eames with a familiarity -- not to mention a sensuality -- that's infuriating in its own right.

Arthur uncrosses his arms and levels the gun. "Give me one good reason not to shoot you both," he challenges.

"Because you like to watch," says the projection, eyes narrowed, smile sharp. "You want to watch what you can't have."

Eames says nothing for a long beat. He just stares at Arthur -- at Arthur, not at Arthur's projection. "Because denial doesn't change anything," he says at last.

* * *

Eames likes to think he knows Arthur fairly well by now. He definitely knows him well enough to spot the pivot point, the moment where Arthur decides to acknowledge what he wants and just ... _goes_ for it, sliding into Eames' space, pulling him round so that his back's to that oh-so-affectionate impostor, so that Eames is suddenly sandwiched (and oh, the images flood fast and strong with that word) between Arthur and Arthur.

He'd say something -- "three's a crowd", though he's really not complaining, or "steady on, don't want this to get confusing" -- except Arthur, the Arthur whose dream this is, the Arthur who's just let his Glock wisp away into nothingness, is kissing him. He's a surprisingly messy kisser, biting Eames' lips, invading his mouth, teeth and tongue and press of flesh. And really, this is all Eames expected and more -- and yet there _is_ more, because the projection's pressing against him from shoulder to thigh, moulding to Eames' back like memory foam, breath hot on the back of Eames' neck as he kisses and licks and, and honestly Eames is not going to last under the attentions of this doubled Arthur.

Then Arthur is pulling back from the kiss (with a lingering nip at Eames' mouth that makes him moan) and, fuck, he's looking over Eames' shoulder, looking at _himself_ , and Eames can't actually read whatever signals they're sending one another but just the fact of it, the fact that Arthur and his projection are apparently ganging up on him, is enough to make Eames gasp and buck between them. If Arthur were to change his mind right now and blow them both out of the dream (which, heaven forbid: Eames tightens his hold on Arthur, and oh, it's fucking _excellent_ the way that Arthur's muscles tighten under his hands) there'd still be more than enough material for a thousand filthy fantasies.

Arthur doesn't seem to be going anywhere. Nor does his projection. There are four hands on Eames (neck, chest, arse, cock); there are two mouths grinning against his skin, two cocks grinding against him. It's kind of unnerving to be the focus of this doubled attention. It is also the hottest thing that has ever happened to Eames, and he's damned if he'll simply let them take him apart like this.

"Just because I'm outnumbered," he manages, rather more hoarsely than he'd've liked, "doesn't mean I'm outgunned."

"No more guns, Mr Eames," murmurs the Arthur behind him, with a twist of his hips that brings a lame joke to mind. Eames bites it back, not least because the Arthur in _front_ of him has worked one deft hand down to unbutton Eames' fly, and Eames can't help the noise he makes -- words are somewhat beyond him at the present time -- when he feels those cool clever fingers close around his cock.

"Or would you prefer," says Arthur-in-front, his hand tortuously slow, "that we took this up a level?"

"Depends ... what you mean by that," says Eames raggedly. "Up a level waking up? Or up a level getting -- oh _fuck_ , Arthur -- getting ..."

It'd be somewhat embarrassing in any other circumstance, to confess that he's lost the gift of the gab. But for fuck's sake, nobody, _nobody_ could be expected to retain any kind of mental function under the doubled assault of two Arthurs. The one behind him has slid his hand between the buttons of Eames' shirt -- actually, one of those buttons seems to have gone missing -- and is pressing a thumb right against his nipple, and maybe Eames should just go with the flow since they've got him pinned, they've got him --

"Whatever you want," purrs an Arthur against his ear. That's the projection, Eames is almost sure. Almost.

"Do you want to wake up, Mr Eames?"

"Fuck, no," says Eames before his better judgement can kick in. "I want ..."

 _Fuck_ words. Eames bites down, hard, on the collarbone of Arthur in front of him -- he's pretty sure that's the original, the Arthur whose dream's turned out so improbably entertaining -- and twists back until he can grab the other Arthur's chin and angle him in for a kiss. He's feverish with want, achingly hard, and his ears are ringing. Better not be an imminent heart attack, because if he wakes up before this is over he'll kick himself.

* * *

Arthur thinks he must've thrown a switch somewhere in his head, from OFF to ON, no half measures; _double_ measures if anything, and fuck, it'd be mind-blowing if he could feel what his projection's feeling -- feel Eames writhe under more than just two hands, taste Eames' nape as well as his mouth, feel Eames arching back the way he can feel Eames fucking forward into Arthur's grip -- except the sensory overload might actually be too much for any human brain to process.

It's like the craziest wet dream ever. Arthur loves the way his projection instantly knows what he's going to do next; the way it brackets Eames, gives Arthur something solid to shove Eames against, gives Eames another reason to groan as Arthur bites from ear to throat. The projection's hands touch Arthur, too, but only incidentally, only on their way from one erogenous zone to another. It's not as though Arthur isn't familiar with his own touch. He's simply not used to watching Eames unravel under his hands.

Not that Eames is passive. For all his abandon, he's kept some control: he gets Arthur unzipped and jacks him slowly -- slower than Arthur's doing him -- a couple of times. Arthur can see the projection scowling, which is just too fucking bad. Then Eames makes a sharp, shocked sound, thrusting into Arthur's fist, and Arthur's pretty certain that the projection's made up for being sidelined by shoving his hand down the back of Eames' pants and --

Arthur is one hundred percent in favour of making Eames come, by any means necessary and as often as possible. This might never happen again (though, in a moment of honesty, he accepts that it's infinitely more likely to recur now, awake or asleep, than it was before his projection tipped the scales) and there's a sense of urgency, of wanting to do everything all at once -- suck and fuck, finger and rim and sixty-nine, kiss and talk and kiss, rinse and repeat -- that's both dizzyingly hot and kind of stressful.

His projection's giving him the kind of narrow-eyed meaningful look that Arthur probably turns on his colleagues a dozen times a day. He should probably get to know his own signals, if -- ah.

The office carpet is cheap and rough under his knees, but rugburn isn't going to be a problem once he's woken up unless he chooses to repeat the experience. From the shaky but enthusiastic way that Eames says his name when he licks the head of Eames' dick, Arthur's positive that neither of them is going to pass on the opportunity for more of this, in reality or in the dreamshare.

He can hear the wet sound of his projection's fingers working Eames open. Must be spit-slicked, unless the projection's managed to dream up lube: but then, he's Arthur (well, he's Arthur's unacknowledged lust for Eames), and Arthur's whole job description is about being prepared. And _Christ_ Arthur would like to feel Eames opening 'round him, he'd love to fuck Eames, but not this time, he's not going to last because Eames is really, _really_ into this, fucking into Arthur's mouth (if Arthur gags a bit, that's okay: dreamspace means never having to say you're sorry, and anyway Arthur can just dream himself more skilful), whining and twisting between the two of them, between Arthur and Arthur: coming, with a curse, in Arthur's mouth, not deep enough for Arthur to swallow it all but he's hauling Arthur to his feet (and maybe there's an extra hand, hot and damp, to help) and kissing Arthur hard, moaning into his mouth. Eames' hand slides back down to where it was before Arthur dropped to his knees, he’s wrapping his fingers round Arthur's dick and jerking him fast and hard and yeah, Arthur's, Arthur's _gone_.

"Fuck," says someone eventually. Arthur, who's somehow on the floor again, takes a moment to register that it's his own voice, though rather higher-pitched than he's used to hearing it.

"Just a dream," whispers Eames raggedly against Arthur's ear. He's wrapped around Arthur, not exactly clinging or cuddling but rather closer to that end of the spectrum than it might have been, before. His head's on Arthur's shoulder, and he's looking up at Arthur from under those ridiculous eyelashes. Arthur wants to rewind and do it all again.

Arthur looks up to where the projection's standing, distinctly apart from the two of them, hands in pockets, expression as blank as Arthur's ever managed.

* * *

Eames feels as though he's forged himself into some kind of avatar of bliss. He's not exactly sated, even though his orgasm's still thrumming through his veins, making his vision blur, making him gasp against Arthur's (Arthur's!) sweaty-damp neck. But: fuck.

He's only touching one Arthur. Right now he wants to be completely, claustrophobically _enclosed_ by Arthurs. He wonders how many projections Arthur could muster for a repeat performance. He wonders how many Arthurs he could take.

Is this even the real Arthur, the man he's holding, the man who's holding him? Eames doesn't think he can be certain of anything right now. He raises his head -- bad move, he's a bit wobbly from the sheer excess of the past ten minutes -- and peers at the Arthur he's ... well ... cuddling.

Arthur's not even looking at Eames. He's staring over Eames' shoulder at -- okay, at himself. Eames winds his neck round to stare, too.

The Arthur who's standing over there is scowling at them both. As if Eames' attention has tipped a balance, wrenched the words out of him, he says, "That's it, then. You won't be needing me any more. Gonna shoot me?"

"Maybe," says the Arthur in Eames' arms, scowling right back. The two Arthurs, Eames notes for the first time, are dressed identically. _His_ Arthur's rather more dishevelled. "Then again," he says, "maybe not. You never know when I might need reminding of what it is I want."

"What about what _I_ want?" snaps -- yeah, it's got to be the projection.

"Fuck off," says Arthur. "You're me. We got what we wanted."

Eames is pretty sure he's not imagining the way Arthur's arms tighten around him. Proprietary. He likes that.

" _You_ got it," objects the projection. There are red marks on his neck -- Eames vaguely recalls the give of skin under his fingernails -- and he's still hard. The bulge of his erection ruins the line of his trousers.

"We got it," insists Arthur, stubborn as ever despite the fact that he's just got off with Eames' hand on him, with Eames' tongue in his mouth.

"Only you," murmurs Eames, amused. "Only you, Arthur, could argue with yourself about ..." He waves a hand. "About this."

Arthur huffs a laugh, and simultaneously the projection's mouth twitches into half-a-smile.

"I never had a threesome when I was awake," says Arthur meditatively, tilting his head to meet Eames' gaze. "I've got a feeling I've been ruined for it."

"What can I say?" Eames tells him. "I'd be happy to assist your research. Or maybe just ruin you some more."

"Just you and me," says Arthur intently. "I don't want --"

"Hey," says the projection, and he's suddenly right next to them, hauling Arthur to his feet. Eames goes too, because he's not ready to let go of Arthur just yet. The projection's right in Arthur's face, glaring. "I'm not --"

"You are," says Arthur, and _fuck_ he's kissing his projection, himself, fierce and hungry the way he kissed Eames just now (the way he kissed the Eames his projection forged, and fuck, Arthur forged _him_ , that's a compliment like nothing Eames's ever had). Arthur's hands are pinning the projection's arms, and the projection's swaying in towards Arthur, moaning, and they're wrapped around one another like reflections: Eames' cock hardens achingly at the sight of the two of them. He _wants_.

 

Then Arthur's turning, pressing the projection back against Eames -- who'll be fucked (Christ yes, please, _yes_ ) if he'll refuse the opportunity to get his hands on Arthur -- but which Arthur, which Arthur?

Eames can't focus. It's as if -- no, they _are_ , they're sliding into, through, each other, and then it's Arthur kissing _him_ , just one Arthur, just one Eames, just the two of them.

"Ready to wake up, Mr Eames?" Arthur says against his mouth. "Ready to take this up another level?"

"Any level you like," says Eames, and closes his eyes, ready for the dream to end.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> From this prompt:  
>  _Arthur likes that he can have two Eames in a dream.  
>  More opportunity for sex of course._

So, this thing with Eames is working out better than Arthur expected. Not that he'd had expectations. Not that he'd ever really thought about it for more than a few idle minutes. But maybe he _would_ have thought about it, if he'd ever seen this side of Eames.

Eames, it turns out, is surprisingly restful company, when both of them are between jobs and they're in the same city (coincidentally or by design). Eames has a knack for finding excellent restaurants in grimy back streets. Eames does occasionally have off-days, and prefers his own company as often as not. Eames makes a reasonable cup of coffee (not rocket science, as long as there's a decent coffee machine) but insists on drinking Celestial Seasonings' most exuberantly-packaged teas. ("Morning Thunder, Eames? What is this shit?")

Eames is still the most competent, reliable person that Arthur's ever worked with. (Nobody would actually believe this.)

Eames is fucking incredible in bed, inventive and shameless, with a wicked streak that got Arthur practically blacking out between climax and hysteria because Eames said something like "and _that's_ why the lady is a tramp" just as he'd done the, the thing with his fingers that sent Arthur over the edge.

(Okay, so nobody would believe that either.)

Arthur's Eames-obsessed projection hasn't shown up since the two of them got together. Arthur can't say he misses it. It's not often he and Eames get much time alone together in dreams -- they're _working_ , goddamnit -- and they both have more than enough ideas about subverting (perverting) the dreamshare.

Arthur, with Eames' enthusiastic collaboration, has achieved orgasm in freefall (messy and gymnastic: 6 out of 10); underwater (coming and going at the same moment: 3 out of 10, with an extra point for timing); bent over a balcony rail with a sheer drop into the abyss right in front of him (8 out of 10, but mostly because of what Eames' mouth was doing to his ass). In short, he no longer has any complaints about his sex life. As far as he knows -- and he's gone to considerable lengths to ensure that this is the case -- Eames also is wholly satisfied.

So once they've finished running through the level, and Eames says over-casually, "We've got half an hour on the clock. Any ... notions you'd like to share?", Arthur's a little taken aback.

"Why?" he says. "Bored already, Mr Eames?"

"Not at all," says Eames, hands in his pockets, slipping Arthur a warm private smile before he turns to look out over the blasted cityscape that Ariadne's spent the last month designing.

("It looks exactly like _Terminator 2_ ," Arthur said when they first went under.

"What?" Ariadne asked.

"Before her time, Arthur," Eames pointed out, with an indulgent expression that’d made Ariadne slap him.)

"Then why --"

"I was ... thinking, the other night."

Arthur's been in Copenhagen until this morning, collecting information on the mark and taking the opportunity to spend an afternoon in Den Frie. "Thinking about me?" he hazards.

"Who else?" says Eames, his smile gaining several magnitudes of brightness. "Thinking of that dream we had on the Oakwood job, where you introduced me to your projection."

"Vice versa, actually."

"Mmm. But while I was ... reviewing said vices, I recalled a promise I made to you."

Arthur blinks at him. He doesn't actually remember Eames saying much at all on that occasion. Certainly not concrete, coherent sentences. On the other hand, he'd been quite distracted himself.

"Surely you remember, Arthur: you've such an excellent memory for detail," purrs Eames.

"Maybe you should remind me," says Arthur, stepping closer until he's just out of Eames' reach. Tantalising.

"I promised I'd ruin you some more," says Eames, his voice half an octave lower than it'd been a moment ago. "Besides, you paid me a number of extravagant compliments, which -- as a gentleman -- I really should return."

Arthur can't remember any compliments, either, except his overarching unspoken desire for Eames. "Whatever I paid," he says, with a smirk, "I don't expect reimbursment for it."

"Oh," says Eames, "but I'd very much like to ... reimburse you. With interest."

* * *

Eames' attention is seldom focused on a single thing. Right now he's admiring the symmetry of Ariadne's shattered city, enjoying an especially vivid sense-memory of Arthur's hands on him in the bathroom at lunchtime, and watching Arthur's expression in his peripheral vision.

Arthur's expression is generally worth watching, because he's so restrained. (Not always, though. When Arthur lets go of his legendary self-control, the expressions -- grimaces, contortions -- he displays are even more worthwhile.) Eames likes to learn, and what he's learnt from -- been reminded of by -- Arthur is that, when it comes to emotional tells, less is more.

Right now Arthur's ... intrigued, Eames decides. Maybe he's trying to imagine how Eames wants to ruin him this time. Arthur does, in fact, have an excellent imagination, when he bothers to use it: Eames likes to inspire him.

"Remember Oakes' office, in the dark?" says Eames.

Arthur arches a brow at him. "What about the fountains at Versailles?" he says. "Those were more impressive."

Eames smiles at him, broad and happy. "A Freudian would've had a field day with the fountains," he says. "But you paid me a great compliment, on the Oakwood job: you forged me, Arthur."

Arthur shrugs. "It wasn't -- there's a reason I don't forge."

"Can you do me again?" says Eames, with a smirk to show that yes, thank you, he's wholly aware of the double entendre and will happily accept responses to either interpretation.

"Doubtful," says Arthur, not even bothering to produce a mirror. "It wasn't exactly me who was forging --"

"Bollocks," says Eames. "Anything your subconscious can do, you can do. Better."

"That's not true, Eames, and you know it." Arthur doesn't look perturbed. He's standing there, smooth and neat, just out of arm's reach (otherwise Eames'd mess him up: he can't resist ruffling Arthur just a little, loosening his tie or unfastening a single button), resolutely himself.

"What if I told you I rather liked it, when you were being me?" counters Eames, turning his back on the ruins and propping his elbows on the balustrade. "What if that's what I want -- you to forge me?"

"Sure you wouldn't sooner go and jerk off?" says Arthur. "I'll watch, if you want."

Eames narrows his eyes, recalling one memorable occasion when he did rub one out all over Arthur's mouth and chin and throat. "You're trying to distract me."

Arthur glances down, pointedly, at Eames' trousers. "Looks like I'm succeeding."

Eames rolls his eyes, leans over and catches Arthur's hand in his own, pulling him closer. Arthur, for a wonder, lets himself be pulled.

"Don't pretend you didn't get a kick out of watching your projection molest me, Arthur."

Arthur snorts. "Not half as much of a kick as you did. I'm surprised it didn't kick you right out of the dream."

"My point," says Eames, and loses his train of thought for a moment as Arthur presses against him, presses him against the stonework. Arthur's kissing him, sweet and slow, and nobody could concentrate through that.

"Your point, Mr Eames?" says Arthur.

"My point. Yes. My point is that it was incredibly hot when you forged me, Arthur. Not just because it meant you'd been looking at me, _seeing_ me." Eames slides his arm around Arthur's waist. "Because it was ... it was as though I was watching the two of us, you and me, on film."

"I've got a webcam," says Arthur, wilfully obtuse. The corner of his mouth twitches: Eames pokes it with his tongue.

"And then your projection was you. And I got to watch."

"And then," concludes Arthur, "you watched me kiss myself: and now you think I want to watch two of you."

"... You don't?" says Eames. Okay, so it's not everyone's idea of fun, but he thought Arthur might be up for a variation on the theme. (Thought about it more than once, though his projections are rather less biddable, or perhaps simply more bloody-minded, than Arthur's.)

"Hmm," says Arthur. "You're kind of distracting in the singular -- especially when you do that." He writhes a little against Eames' exploratory grope. "If there were two of you paying attention to me, touching me, making me lose it..."

"Yes?" prompts Eames, when Arthur seems disinclined to continue.

" _Fuck_ , yes," says Arthur.

* * *

Arthur should probably be embarrassed by how quickly he gets hard when Eames -- in that light, nonchalant voice -- starts talking about giving Arthur a taste of his own medicine. But Eames, all by himself, is quite enough to distract Arthur from the wreckage of the city around them; the notion of duplicating that incendiary mouth, those big agile hands, the sheer anchoring bulk of the man, is...

" _Fuck_ , yes," says Arthur. "Yes please, Mr Eames."

Eames raises an eyebrow. "Right here? Right now?"

"How?" says Arthur. "I don't see any projections. And I don't recall you having particularly good control over them last time we came down."

"Didn't have any reason to control them," says Eames, running his hand down over the back seam of Arthur's pants.

"What, apart from them trying to kill us?"

"Part of the setup," says Eames. "But you're right."

"Of course I'm right," snaps Arthur.

Eames chuckles. Arthur bites him.

"You're right about there being no projections on this run," he clarifies. "And it's probably not worth trying to populate the level at this point, given that we've got, oh --" He glances at his watch, the hands of which are spinning meaninglessly. "-- no more than twenty minutes before we wake up."

"Are you saying you need more than twenty minutes?" says Arthur, politely disbelieving. "At lunchtime it was all over in --"

"If a job's worth doing," says Eames, curving his hand around Arthur's hip 'til his thumb presses lightly against Arthur's dick, "it's worth doing properly. But, tell you what, I'll give you a little something to keep you keen."

"What the fuck, Eames?" Arthur really, really hates being made to feel like he's the only one who wants this. "I'm --"

He's seen Eames forge without a mirror before: he can't even begin to imagine how that works. Forging isn't something he's ever had much aptitude for, though apparently his subconscious mind's got a better handle on the skill. Come to think of it, his projection -- the one that pretty much stood for 'Arthur's repressed lust for Mr Eames' -- did melt from Arthur to Eames without a referential reflection.

And now Eames is melting, melding, morphing from Eames to Arthur.

The transformation is slow, as though Eames wants Arthur to recognise each step of the process, each element that distinguishes the two of them. His nose squashes and shortens; his eyes warm and darken; the mouth that's kissing Arthur's becomes less biteably lush above a squarer jaw; even the _taste_ of him changes. Arthur stumbles, Eames no longer counterbalancing his weight.

He's actually pretty skeeved, kissing himself. It's not like the projection on the Oakwood job, the one he knew he had to ... subsume, take in, make into a part of himself. It's like Arthur imagines kissing a sibling would be. The physical attraction he feels for Eames simply melts away as Eames' features melt into Arthur's.

But if he ever needed proof that what he felt for Eames wasn't simple physical attraction, he's got it now. Because it may be Arthur's own body kissing him, but it's animated by Eames. It's Eames' mind behind the forge, Eames who lets Arthur bite down harder than usual on his lip (there won't be a mark when they wake), Eames who dreams up a full-length cheval mirror and turns Arthur gently in his embrace so that Arthur can see the picture they make, together, himself and his doppelganger.

Okay, skeevy but also surprisingly hot.

"If I wanted to get off with myself," he says anyway, breaking the kiss and letting Eames sigh dramatically against his neck, "I'd just find a mirror."

"I suggested that, if you recall, but --"

"You did not," says Arthur. "And you're missing the point. What I want isn't me, Eames: it's you. You and the way you look at me. You squared."

"Squared? Does that mean I can root --"

Eames' forgery is, as always, exact in every detail. Arthur takes great pleasure in grabbing the copy of his own Glock from the back of Eames' copied pants while he's still groaning at the pun. He tucks the barrel under Eames' uncannily clean-shaven chin for a neat headshot.

It's nothing at all like suicide.

* * *

Arthur's tendency to terminate Eames' dreams the quick and dirty way, with a bullet, clearly hasn't been tempered by sentimentality. This is almost certainly a good thing for future jobs together: it means that, regardless of how very enthusiastic Arthur might be about fucking Eames, he’s not going to let that enthusiasm (or the sheer affection that occasionally manifests when they're alone together) get in the way of a contract.

No, if there's a weak link, it's Eames himself, who's starting to resent the attention he has to pay to this particular job (ruined city, the mark as sole survivor bequeathing his secrets to himself, and not even the presence of killer robots to spice things up) because it detracts from the attention he wants to pay Arthur.

It's their first night together for a while, so Eames sets his more surreal notions aside and lets Arthur take him to pieces with hands and tongue and cock -- returns the favour, of course, because that's only gentlemanly and besides, getting Arthur dishevelled and desperate is the best kind of 'welcome back'. But Arthur's tired -- "Jet lag's a bitch," he apologises, padding back from his shower and stretching out an inch from Eames' bare skin -- and Eames is still wide awake.

"No problem," he says. "Mind if I catch up on my email? I've got a few things that need looking at."

"Sure, whatever," mumbles Arthur into the pillow.

Eames considers locking himself in the bathroom, but settles instead on the couch with his laptop and the PASIV. Comfort and safety trump the risk of Arthur waking up, finding him dreaming, and barging in on Eames' ... exercises.

He spends a while reading up on lucidity and the subconscious: the natural history, if you will, of projections. A lot of what he uncovers is post-grad work, studies still in progress; but Eames never met an academic security system that he couldn't crack, and anyway Cobb's pretty predictable with his passwords. What Eames wants to know, though -- how to control, corral, cajole his _own_ projections -- doesn't seem to be covered by any of the papers he reads.

Well. It's hardly the first time he's figured something out from first principles.

He sets the timer for five minutes and goes under, into a room he's used before for testing forgeries. It's modelled on the dance studio where he used to meet one of his exes after class: a high ceiling with skylights that are streaked with pigeon-shit (it's London, after all), a parquet floor, a ghetto blaster incongruously playing classical music, and wall-to-wall mirrors. He makes sure the door in the corner of the room is left invitingly open as he runs through his own variations on barre exercises. Depp, Angelina, Obama, Osama: Madonna and Garbo, Cary Grant and Fred Astaire. Remembering Ariadne's ruined City of Angels, he attempts a Terminator, and as soon as the red LED of his eye starts to blink the first projection breezes in.

Eames slides back into his own skin -- just skin, with only ink to cover it -- and turns to welcome them, propping his elbows back on the barre and laying himself out, keeping his mind firmly on lust and lechery and refusing to let anything, any _one_ , else into his thoughts.

Turns out he still, after all this time, has some issues with sex.

He has to take out the first two projections -- a tall dark-skinned man with a gleamingly bald skull, a petite redhead whose curves spill out of her little black dress -- before they can do too much damage. (Okay, he can smooth away the clawmarks, the blood and the bruising with a thought. That's not the point.)

"Fight or fuck?" says the third projection, and Eames almost blows the whole thing by laughing out loud, because this is _himself_. Him at eighteen or so, anyway: androgynously pretty, kohled and glossed, belligerent as fuck. He's bare to the waist (and considerably less inked: there's hardly any history on that soft pale skin) and his hair ... fuck, his hair's a mess.

"C'mon, mate," says the projection, and the flat nasal blur of it evokes a whole other life that Eames has closed and put away. "Ain't got all day. What'll it be?"

"Think you're man enough to fuck me?" taunts Eames, because if there's one thing he does know it's how to rile this teenage chrysalis of himself. And if Eames can persuade him to behave like ... well, like the average eighteen-year-old, then chances are good that he'll be able to manifest this same projection -- or one that's functionally identical -- when he's dreaming with Arthur.

"You bet," says the projection with a smirk, looking him up and down in a way that's obviously calculated to offend.

"D'you know who I am?" says Eames. It's not a topic that comes up often when his projections are trying to kill Arthur or Ariadne or some mark, but he's always wondered what projections think of their originator.

The projection shrugs, and Eames admires the effect. All sinew and bone, this one: rather younger than he'd be comfortable with awake, but --

"You're me," says the projection. "I'm you. So we don't need to bother talking about it, eh?"

Eames chuckles. He stays where he is, propped up against the barre (haha: should've shifted it to the _other_ kind of bar, so he could have a drink and a smoke afterwards, but it's not worth changing now), and watches appreciatively as his younger self unbuckles his belt and drops his jeans. Of _course_ he's not wearing underwear. Eames is pleased to note that, not only is the projection distinctly enthusiastic about the prospect of getting down and dirty with an older self, but said projection's also extremely well-hung. Good to know I'm not harbouring any subconscious fears of inadequacy, thinks Eames.

The projection -- no, fuck it, it's _him_ : Eames refuses to distance himself -- Eames the Younger's hands are warm and dry, barely callused but surprisingly confident as they touch Eames' own skin, tracing the curves of tattoos that are still in that younger self's future, testing the muscle that underlies them. Eames lets himself be touched. He can remember the thrill of taking control when he was eighteen; can still feel the sheer exuberant triumph of fucking an older bloke for the first time. Not that he's necessarily up for the full monty -- his dream-body's still blissfully stretched and sore from Arthur, who's sleeping the sleep of the well-fucked not ten metres from where Eames dreams, and --

There's a flicker of uncertainty in teenaged Eames' wide-pupilled eyes, as if he's sensed Eames' sudden self-doubt. It's not as if this constitutes infidelity (it's not, for fuck's sake, as if he and Arthur have ever even _talked_ about being exclusive). It's really no more noteworthy than taking himself off to the shower to have a wank. But...

"You better tell me what you want," says Young Eames, all bluster and bravado. "Or I'll just have to help meself."

Eames raises an eyebrow. "I'd like to see you try," he says. "No, hold your horses." He gets his younger self's sinewy wrist pinned, twisting his arm up behind him, and their skins are sparking against one another from shoulder to hip. "I'll tell you what I want," he whispers, low and harsh, against the other's ear. "There's a job I need you for."

Teenaged Eames rolls his eyes. "Yeah, pull the other one. I'm your subconscious, right? So you don't get a say in what I do, and I just get to mix shit up when you're not looking."

"A hundred years of psychological theory," says Eames, amused, "and that's the best we can come up with?"

The boy's mouth is sulky. Eames suspects this effect is entirely contrived, but _fuck_ it's effective. He's no Arthur: he doesn't have any qualms about being turned on by what's basically his own self. Quite the opposite, in fact: he'd love to fuck that lipglossed mouth, and he's pretty sure the enjoyment would be mutual.

"There's a job," Eames repeats, "and I need you in on it, okay?" He angles Young Eames' arm a degree or two higher, and gets a sharp inhalation and a sharper glare. He doesn't need to glance down to be sure that they're both hard.

"What's going to happen," says Eames, "is that next time I want you, you're going to show up, okay? And I'll have someone with me, and --"

"Arthur," says his younger self. It's practically a sneer.

"Yes," says Eames. "Arthur. And we're going to take him apart."

* * *

Jet lag's a bitch, all right: and more to the point, Arthur can't stay asleep when he's pretty sure Eames is plugged in and plotting. He dozed off after they fucked, but he keeps drifting awake, aware that he's alone in the bed -- which is still the rule rather than the exception with him and Eames -- and that Eames, therefore, must be ... otherwise occupied.

It's not that Arthur's nervous. He respects Eames' professional competencies, and enjoys the sheer creative ebullience of his work. He's fairly sure that Eames won't do anything to discomfort him: quite the reverse. Eames likes to show off, and he's proved, over and over, that he pays attention to Arthur: that he knows what Arthur likes, and can predict with unsettling accuracy what Arthur _wants_. And it's not as though they don't already have sex -- inventive, athletic, exhausting and exhaustive sex: Eames is like some kind of depraved Muse of Sodomy -- as often as is practical.

He's not nervous. He's only startling awake in the rumpled bed, blinking against the dim light of the lamp from the other room, because he's buzzing with anticipation. It's like ... it's like Christmas, thinks Arthur, and the thought makes him chuckle to himself: which makes him hold his breath in case Eames hears him and comes in to see what's woken him up.

But there's no sound from the other room. Eames must be hooked up to the PASIV, busy constructing a setting for whatever orgiastic excesses he's planning. Okay, it's like Christmas, but Arthur was never the kid who crept downstairs in the middle of the night to peer at the labels on the gifts under the tree and shake the ones that were meant for him. He likes surprises. Well -- he _used_ to like surprises. Not so much any more: in their line of work, a surprise usually means a setback at best, and more often a fuck-up.

Arthur's surprised to realise that he trusts Eames to surprise him in the _good_ way.

But still...

A glance at the clock tells him he's slept for just over an hour. In Copenhagen (which is where he woke up yesterday) it's eight in the morning: hardly surprising his sleep cycle's screwed. He throws back the sheet, pulls on his boxers and pads silently into the next room, where Eames, as predicted, is curled up on the couch with a needle in his arm. Arthur mentally mocks himself for having expected Eames to put some clothes on -- even a robe, for Christ's sake -- before going under. On the other hand, Eames naked and dreaming, wholly relaxed and perfectly motionless, is a rare and appealing sight. Arthur takes a moment to appreciate it.

Only a moment. It's perfectly clear to Arthur that he's about to infiltrate Eames' dream, exhibiting just about the same amount of respect for Eames' privacy as Eames'd shown for Arthur's on the Oakwood job. Though, to be fair, Arthur has considerably more reason, now, to assume that he'll be welcome in Eames' subconscious.

According to the timer on the PASIV, the dream has just under three minutes to run. (Arthur has no way of knowing how long Eames has been dreaming already.) They've been using Yusuf's compound, so three minutes works out to an hour. Will an hour be long enough for whatever Eames is planning? Probably ( _hopefully_ ) not: Arthur enters the override code and sets the timer for an extra seven minutes. They can always go back down, and he's never been averse to suiciding out of dreamspace.

He slides his arm under Eames' knees and shifts him 'til there's space for two on the couch. Eames goes easily; Arthur wonders whether he feels the manhandling, down there in the dream. Just in case -- and because _Arthur_ has imagination too, thank you very much -- he leans over and curls his tongue around Eames' nipple; strokes him slowly from knee to hip, and trails his fingers across Eames' dick, which is still slightly sticky with lube and come.

Eames twitches, and Arthur withdraws his hand. He makes himself comfortable on the couch -- Yusuf's stuff tends to come on quick and relentless, like a tsunami -- before he uncoils a second line, pumps his fist to pop the vein, and slides the needle in.

"Ready or not," he murmurs, nudging Eames' unconscious body, "here I come."

 

Nobody's ever been able to work out exactly what determines someone's point of entry into a dreamscape. Regardless of whether there's an architect to design and map it, the dreamscape's already there, extant in the dreamer's mind. Arthur's accustomed to finding himself streets or miles apart from the rest of his team, even when they've all gone down together.

When Arthur was in high school he spent one winter playing DOOM, and when he was in single-player mode he liked to check out the detail on each level. There was a god-mode macro that let you walk through walls, and sometimes you'd find yourself in a blur of pixels beyond the edge of the level.

Right now he'd guess that Eames used to do the same, because when Arthur's eyes open in the dream, it's to a flickering vagueness, a void without shape or form. Sure, there's gravity, but it's not pressing him down _against_ anything. He glances down. His feet, against blank blackness, are bare.

So, it turns out, is the rest of him. Which won't do. He's more than happy to strip down for Eames, but not until he knows that Eames is all he's going to be facing. As he steps forward, he shapes himself a suit of charcoal-black wool, a snowy linen shirt, shoes and socks. There's the comforting weight of a gun in the hollow of his back, and when he runs his fingers through his hair it stays flat. Right.

Ahead of him there's a crack in the nothingness, a vertical line of light. He heads for it, and finds light shining through a door that's been left invitingly ajar. Beyond the door, he can hear music (Tchaikovsky, by the sound of it; a heavy-handed solo piano version of something from _Swan Lake_ ) and voices. One of the voices is Eames. One of them's ...

Arthur frowns. He leans forward, off-balance but invisible to anyone inside the room, and toes the door open a little more. The room's a studio, full of light, redoubled and reflected back from the mirrored walls and the glossy parquet floor: it gleams on Eames' bare skin and the familiar curves of his tattoos, and on the slighter form of the naked man facing him.

More a boy than a man, to be honest: far too young for Arthur's taste, and he's more than a little uncomfortable with the idea that Eames might want someone who's barely legal. Because it's clear that Eames _does_ want the kid. They're shoving and pawing at each other, half-fighting and half something else. A dance? Not quite, despite the music: it's too open, too random, too free. Eames is laughing breathlessly, winding up his companion, making it look effortless when he bears him to his knees.

Arthur blinks, and looks more closely. The kid's inked too, and Arthur knows those patterns intimately. This scrawny, scrappy teenager is Eames, a preliminary sketch of the Eames he knows, Eames a decade younger and -- from the sound of it -- a decade less practiced at keeping his emotions masked. Arthur should go through the door, step forward, break it up, break on in: but there's something -- specificity, he reminds himself -- there's an erotic charge spiking and spiralling almost visibly between the two of them.

Hell, Arthur wants to be a part of that. He's getting hard just watching as the kid licks a loop around Eames' left nipple, exactly the way that Arthur touched Eames, awake, moments ago and worlds away. He doesn't know if he's meant to be seeing this. He doesn't know if this is for him or just for Eames. He doesn't even know if it's the first time Eames has gone under, gone looking for this younger self. (And _fuck_ if he'll get jealous of the guy's subconscious.) But he feels, right now, as if he's stuck outside this level in the pixellated blur, unable to take a step over the threshold, unable to do anything but wait and watch as Eames's big hand tips his younger self's skull just so, the perfect angle for --

"Why don't you join us, Arthur?" comes Eames' voice, sudden and loud above the jangling piano. "We're just working on the ... the choreography, I s'pose you could call it. I'm sure you've something of value to bring to the discussion."

"So this would be the undress rehearsal?" says Arthur, putting that extra length into his stride so it looks like he owns the room, owns the situation. He sees Eames register this, and if Eames thinks he's in control here then he'd better think again, because Arthur's blood's up, he's hard and humming with adrenaline. He's in the mood to call the shots, and if he has two Eameses at his disposal then all the better.

Eames smirks at him. "Just ... running through a few moves," he says.

The projection scowls at Arthur, but makes no move to interfere: just kneels there, not exactly biddable but biding his time. Arthur kind of wants to pet him, wind him up a bit: Eames has a surprising amount of self-control in the bedroom, but if this younger version of him is rooted in anything real, he's likely hot-tempered and reckless and easy to bait.

Oh, _fuck_ , this is going to be fun.

"I'm impressed," says Arthur, raking Eames' body -- naked, erect, glimmering with sweat in the warm diffuse light of the studio -- with a contemplative gaze before he turns his attention to the younger, less muscular version. "How did you talk him into this?"

"He din't need to talk me into it," says the projection in that flat London accent that Arthur's only heard, awake, when Eames is on the phone to his contacts back home. "He said we was goin' to take you down."

Eames rolls his eyes. Arthur laughs at them both. "Is that right?" he says. "From where I'm standing, looks like it's the other way round."

"What d'you want, then?" says the projection. "D'you want to fuck me?"

Arthur makes a show of pacing around the two of them. It's not a hardship to look at all that bare flesh. "Not sure you're up to it," he says, kindly.

Eames emits an undignified snorting sound, and Arthur turns on him. "Something you wanted to add, Mr Eames?" He's still marvelling at the apparent autonomy of Eames' projection: it's vanishingly rare to see a projection with more than basic social functionality. Okay, occasionally a projection will take on a weird ersatz life of its own, will manifest in dream after dream and start talking back as though it's a person in its own right: that's how this whole game started, with Arthur's rogue projection inciting Eames.

"Nothing, Arthur," says Eames. Arthur narrows his eyes: he's learnt not to trust that light, disarming tone of voice. "Just wondering if you were going to ... suggest anything."

"All mouth," the projection chips in.

"You better believe it," says Arthur, with a sharp smile. He taps his belt buckle. "Speaking of mouths, why don't you get over here and show me what yours can do, besides answer back?"

The projection's eyes go dark and hot, pupils blown. There's eyeliner, or something, around his eyes, and it's smudged and streaked with sweat. He doesn't hesitate: he's on his feet, swinging round, dropping down in front of Arthur without waiting for Eames to give him the go-ahead. Arthur likes that.

"How many projections can you control at once?" he says over the projection's head to Eames, who's watching avidly as his younger self's hands get busy with Arthur's clothes. _Carefully_ busy, Arthur notes: he'd bet young Eames didn't get much practice undressing men in good suits, but perhaps Eames' indubitable skills in that area have percolated down to his subconscious.

"What?" says Eames. "Oh, I don't know. Never really had a reason to mess around with them before. And I should warn you, it's not exactly _control_."

The kid makes an animalistic growling noise when he discovers that Arthur didn't bother dreaming up underwear. His tongue's as quick and devious as Eames': Arthur knots his hand in the sticky, spiky hair and twists, and the kid moans.

"Not control?" says Arthur, once he's sure he can keep his voice businesslike.

"Nope," says Eames. "I suppose you could say we're simply on the same page."

"He's further down the page than you are," says Arthur, and if his voice hitches as the projection wraps a hand around his shaft to keep from choking as he bobs his head forward, that's excusable.

"Is that a complaint?" Eames looks amused. He's prowling closer, and yeah, Arthur does kind of want to let Eames do ... whatever. Anything. But Eames gets his own way too much of the time.

"Yeah," says Arthur. "Yes, it is."

* * *

Eames loves it when Arthur's in a controlling mood: doesn't mean he has to roll over and take it. (Not yet, anyway.) He holds back a moment, admiring the sight of his younger self giving Arthur a messily enthusiastic blowjob. Eames has always had a knack for that, and part of being good at giving head is showing how much you love doing it. Young Eames loves it, all right: his cock looks painfully hard, and there's a pool of precome glistening on the shiny parquet. The noises the kid's making around Arthur's sizeable cock would be enough, all by themselves, to get Eames off. He wishes the music weren't so loud. (Abruptly, it's not.)

Luckily he's got four other senses with which to relish the situation.

Arthur is still pristine in his lovely suit. Eames' projection's pretty much deep-throating him now -- a skill Eames didn't actually master until his early twenties, but authenticity is really not the point here -- and with his face pressed against Arthur's groin, no more than a crescent of Arthur's skin is visible. Eames thinks that's a shame, and since Arthur seems to want him to participate (if that fearsome glare's anything to go by), the least he can do is address himself to ... undressing Arthur.

He props his chin on Arthur's shoulder and rubs his stubbled cheek against Arthur's smooth jawline. "What d'you want?" he murmurs. "D'you want me to fuck you while you fuck my mouth?" He brings a hand round to gesture expressively at his younger self. "Or --"

" _Fuck_ ," says Arthur. "I should have realised I couldn't keep more than one of you quiet like this. No, Mr Eames, you're not going to fuck me. I'm going to fuck you."

"Both of us?" says Eames brightly. "Or just me?" (Eames the Younger makes a muffled, protesting noise.)

"Not at the same time," snaps Arthur irritably. "Though ... hmm."

"Do share," says Eames, slipping his hands beneath Arthur's jacket and pressing his right thumb firmly against Arthur's peaked nipple.

Arthur hisses, and angles his head obligingly so that Eames can trail kisses and bites along his jawline. "I think ... I think I'd like to fuck you both. See if I can tell the difference. See if ... _fuck_ , Eames," and his hand's clenching in Eames the Younger's hair, "see if you can keep your concentration enough to blow yourself with my dick in your ass."

Eames can't help shoving his cock against Arthur's arse at that ridiculously provocative image. He's probably smearing precome all over Arthur's trousers, but if he has his way Arthur's going to lose them sooner rather than later. He starts unbuttoning Arthur's shirt.

"You like that idea, huh?" says Arthur, rather breathlessly.

Eames pretends to consider it. "Hmm," he says. "So, what: you're going to fuck him while he blows me, then fuck me while I do him? _Admirable_ stamina, Arthur: you'll put me to shame."

"It's a dream, fuckwit," says Arthur fondly. "We can come as often as we like."

"Good point," says Eames. "So what, exactly, are we waiting for?" He bucks, hard, against Arthur's arse, and is rewarded by a groan from Arthur and a rough gagging noise from the kid. "Fuck his mouth, Arthur. Fuck his mouth and come so deep he can't even taste it."

He glances down. That's _his_ face -- okay, not quite how he looks now, but definitely the face he used to see in the mirror -- red and wet with tears that have nothing to do with pain or distress, everything to do with having a thick hard cock shoved right down his throat, and if this is what blokes saw when he was turning tricks in the loos at Trade, no wonder he was so bloody popular. Arthur seems to approve, if the ragged hitch to his breath is any indication.

"C'mon, do it, take the edge off," says Eames encouragingly, hitching Arthur's shirt aside to pinch and twist his nipples. He bites, hard, at the hinge of Arthur's jaw, ruts against his arse (which has the concomitant effect of forcing Arthur's cock even further down the projection's throat) and gets his free hand down the back of Arthur's trousers. That does the trick. Arthur freezes, makes that weird little high-pitched whining noise, and shudders his way through what Eames is determined will be the first of several impressive orgasms.

* * *

Arthur can think of worse places to be than sandwiched between Eames and Eames. He's still dizzy from coming down the kid's throat; the edges of his vision are blurred, and the room's much brighter than it did a moment ago. His dick's too sensitive for the way that Eames' prodigal projection (because really, there's no way Eames was that good that young) is choking and gagging on it. Arthur gets his hand on the kid's head and pulls him back, hissing at the scrape of teeth.

"You like that, huh?" says the projection hoarsely.

Arthur rolls his eyes. Eames' hand is down the back of Arthur's pants, and his fat dry fingers are prodding Arthur's ass in a way that makes him want to get it up again right now. He's still half-hard and getting harder. Eames' dreamspace is particularly flexible when it comes to sex. This does not actually surprise Arthur at all.

"In my pocket," he says to whoever's interested, and it's the Eames behind him who gropes around in Arthur's jacket until he finds the packet of lube that Arthur's just put there.

"You don't need it down here," says Eames. His scruff's scratching the thin skin behind Arthur's left ear, and even _that_ turns out to be erotic. "Just dream --"

"It's not for me," says Arthur. "It's for you. Both of you. You can get each other ready."

"And you'll be...?" enquires Eames, licking Arthur's ear.

Arthur jerks his head away, partly because it's too much but mostly to wind up Eames. "Watching," he says.

"Do we get points for performance?" says the projection, smirking up at him. The kid's still hard, and Arthur's not exactly comfortable with how much he wants to fuck him hard and make him beg.

On the other hand: dreamspace.

"Maybe," says Arthur, extricating himself gently from Eames' ministrations. He dreams up an armchair -- rich dark red velvet, a colour to set off skintones -- and settles himself in it. "Should I expect a horde of Eameses coming to frag me for messing with the decor?"

"Oh, they wouldn't be _fragging_ you," promises Eames, moving around to stand in front of Arthur. The packet of lube is clenched in his fist; his dick's erect, perpen _dic_ ular to his body, and it's on a level with Arthur's mouth. "They'd find you far too ... interesting to drive out."

Arthur breathes out, slowly, and watches Eames' dick twitch at the tickle of air. "Happy to hear it," he says. "Now, weren't you going to give me a floorshow?"

Eames snorts: but he's beckoning his younger self closer, and once the kid is in arm's reach Eames hauls him in and kisses him deep and dirty, both of them moaning.

"Get down here," orders Arthur. "Both of you."

Kissing is complicated with three greedy mouths involved, but Arthur gets his hand around Eames' neck -- the projection's neck, less muscle and more bone -- then bites someone's lip and shoves his tongue into someone's mouth, and maybe he should open his eyes but he doesn't need to see what's going on. Young Eames kisses fast and fierce, tastes of Southern Comfort and cigarettes and spunk; older Eames has that chipped tooth at the back of his upper jaw, and Arthur would recognise the taste of him anywhere, in any company.

One of them grunts, and Arthur forces his eyes open and pulls back from the kiss, because it sounds like they're finally getting with the programme and he really does want to watch this. Eames has to know, better than anyone else ever could, what his younger self wants -- hell, his younger self is _him_ , is a product of his subconscious, not an actual person -- and Arthur's willing to bet that Eames has dreamed up a version of himself that's bang up to date with Eames' taste in foreplay.

Arthur gets his hand on his own dick (because otherwise he's going to lose it and grab the nearest Eames, which is so not the point) while he watches the two of them grab and grope at one another. They're kneeling, facing each other, and the older Eames is slicking up his fingers (it's cinnamon lube, and just the smell of it is enough to make Arthur's ass clench). The projection has stuffed three fingers in his mouth and he's suckling noisily, gasping around his own hand when Eames' hand disappears between his thighs.

Arthur wishes there were a way of videoing a dream.

* * *

... can't remember where he was earlier, can't remember how he got to this place -- what is it, a fucking dance studio or something? -- but no worries, there's nothing wrong with being here now, nude and hard and grinding down on the thick slick fingers of a bloke who's ... who's himself, but older: who's ...

Yeah, yeah. When he thinks about it he knows who (knows what) he is. He's a bit of this bloke's _mind_ , maybe a bit the bloke -- Eames, and how weird is that because that's not _his_ name -- mostly doesn't let show. He didn't just wander in off the street, he didn't hook up with this older self (or with the Yank in the armchair, who's getting off on watching the two of 'em together, filthy bastard: Christ the knob on him) after a night at Trade or Heaven or wherever. He feels like he's popped a couple of Es, maybe with a chaser of amyl, 'cause he's gagging for it here, can't get enough of being opened up and spread wide and face-fucked and ... and how the hell does he even _know_ what tripping out on E feels like?

'Cause this bloke knows what it feels like, that's how. This Eames bloke knows just how to undo him, knows what the Yank (Arthur, Arthur, Arthur, and okay the name tastes good in his mouth, tastes like Arthur's cock did) wants to see and he, Eames, he's giving it to him with bells on.

"That's enough," snaps the Yank. "I wanna fuck him."

"Do you now?" says Eames, twisting his fingers right _there_. "And what about what he wants, hmm?"

They're both looking at him now, and it's ... hot, freaky, enough to make his skin heat up (not that it's cold in here). "Me?" he says blankly. He hasn't got a clue what they want to hear. "I. Yeah. Fucking." He's nodding hard enough that it pushes his arse further down onto Eames' fingers. His cock aches and yeah, fucking or getting fucked, either way's good. He could handle giving it to either of them. Both of them.

"Sure you wouldn't rather have a more ... sophisticated version?" Eames is saying, ducking his head so he can gaze up at Arthur from underneath those long eyelashes. Slut.

Arthur's cock's in his hand, darkly red and throbbing. He's laughing. "You set this up, Mr Eames," he says. "You can't expect me not to take advantage."

"What if I want to be the one you fuck?" says Eames, and that's a _pout_. His older self has no fucking shame.

"Later," says Arthur, grinning. "Right now I'm going to give this one a spin."

The weird thing is that everything he's feeling -- gagging for it, wanting Arthur like he's the only game in town, writhing and desperate like a cat in heat and that's without the fucking noises he can't bite back -- makes sense, but it's not just him feeling it. Some of this has to be from Eames, from the bloke who's somehow brought him into being and who's going to send him back into nothing once --

But Eames' fingers have left him empty and then Arthur's shoving into him, and he doesn't give a shit _who_ wanted to get fucked, because he's fine with second-hand feelings if they feel this good. He wishes he was like them: he can't make things show up just by thinking about them, else he'd think up a _massive_ dildo and shove it up inside Eames to stop him feeling so fucking _empty_. He'd put a cockring on Arthur to keep him doing that forever. He'd -- and _fuck_ , Arthur's dick's hitting him right there but he can't come 'cause that's not what they want. He can smell that bloody lube again, like posh shops at Christmas. Eames is working it into Arthur's arse by the sound of it, and then Arthur makes this funny grunting noise and shoves even harder, deeper: heavier, 'cause there's Eames' weight on top of him as well now, Eames fucking Arthur, Arthur fucked and fucking, sandwiched between the two of them.

It's working even smoother than in a porno. None of them are going to last much longer at this rate, and fuck knows what they've got lined up next and it's not fucking _fair_ that Eames and Arthur are going to wake up once they're finished and do it all over again, for real, for --

He can't think. He's coming, hard enough that it makes his eyes water and his head hurt, and he thinks Arthur's coming too but whatever, doesn't matter, he's just going to...

* * *

For all Eames knows (or cares), the dance studio could have morphed into an assembly line or the Queen's bedroom or the Turbine Hall at Tate Modern. Every nerve in his body is vibrating faster and faster. His vision's gone dark and blotchy, and he can't hear anything except harsh breathing, moans and the wet squelch of sex. Eames's throat is thick with smells that are tastes: cinnamon, spunk and _Arthur Arthur Arthur_.

But even through the blinding immediacy of the fuck, he's aware of his younger self thrashing back against Arthur as his orgasm hits -- whose orgasm? doesn't matter, someone's coming, someone's come -- and then ... it's like the kid's not there any more, though Arthur's still shoving himself deep into _someone's_ arse, and if the projection's disappeared chances are that Arthur'll smash his face against the floor.

Assuming there's still a floor.

Eames can't think about it. Maybe his projections always flicker and fade when he's this close to coming, maybe they turn to clay, maybe they're just zombies, better keep that in mind next time --

" _Arthur,_ " he cries out, and comes.

Everything goes kind of fuzzy after that. He's moving or being moved; Arthur's hissing as Eames' cock (still hard enough for another round, ha) drags out of his arse into the cold air; Arthur's face is mashed against Eames' neck, his nose digging into the soft place above Eames' collarbone.

"Fuck," agrees Arthur eventually. He sounds like he's just run a marathon. Possibly two.

Eames hasn't quite got around to opening his eyes, but he gropes around a bit, trying to find a third body. He can't.

"Where'd he go?"

"Dunno," says Eames. "I lost him."

"Heh," says Arthur. "Your stamina ... needs some work, Eames."

Eames jabs him affectionately in the ribs. "If that's a criticism, feel free to demonstrate the proper method."

Arthur laughs silently against Eames' jugular. It tickles. "If I knew what the fuck you were doing --"

"'The fuck' is exactly what I was doing. Perhaps you noticed."

"Nah, with the projection." Arthur's head lifts away from Eames. "Were you really like that?"

"I was prettier," lies Eames. "And I'd never have run off mid-fuck."

"What?"

Eames stares up at where the ceiling would be if he had the energy to imagine it. His brain's working at about a quarter of normal capacity: it takes him a while to string his thoughts into words. "He was my subconscious, right? So he shouldn't have been something I could control."

"You said you weren't controlling him," says Arthur. "You said you and him were just ... on the same page?"

"Mmm," says Eames. "But I could ... I could feel him, Arthur. I could feel him as though he was a part of me."

"That's not how projections work."

Eames shrugs. Whatever he's lying on, it's soft. Probably not parquet any more, then. "Nevertheless."

"So when I was fucking him, I was fucking you," says Arthur slowly. "While you were fucking me."

"And very delightful it was too," says Eames. "But then ... I don't know, he --"

"It," interjects Arthur.

" _He_ ," says Eames. "He ... I couldn't feel him any more."

Arthur sits up: the room's dark now, but Eames can hear his breath. "He's not here now."

"No, it was ..." Eames gives up on attempting an explanation, since he doesn't actually have a clue what just happened. Apart from a wholly glorious fuck. "It's as though I was... forging him," he says, feeling it out. "But I was myself, too."

Arthur's sudden, sharp attention is tangible. "You can forge into a projection?"

"Well, _I_ don't know, do I?" snaps Eames. "It was an experiment. To see if I could pander to your perverted threesome fantasies. I --"

"Mine?" says Arthur, chuckling: he ducks down and drops a kiss, dry and lingering, on Eames' temple. "I thought it was a _mutual_ fantasy, Mr Eames."

"Well," says Eames, mollified. "Yes."

"It was fucking amazing," says Arthur. "And if you can do that again --"

"Which bit?" says Eames. "The bit where I snogged myself for your entertainment? Or when I blew -- no, we never got around to --"

"We'll have to run some more tests," says Arthur, almost indistinguishable through what sounds like an immense yawn.

"I'm game," says Eames.

-end-

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally posted [here](http://community.livejournal.com/inception_kink/15916.html?thread=32333868#t32333868) at the kink_meme.


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